Creating a film can feel like organized chaos. But with the right approach, you can turn your vision into a masterpiece. Whether you are working on a big-budget movie or creating at home, this guide breaks down every stage of the film production process — from brainstorming your concept to promoting your finished film — with practical tips and resources to help you succeed.
So, what are the stages of film production?
- Concept and idea generation
- Budgeting
- Idea development
- Screenwriting and scriptwriting
- Hiring and recruiting cast and crew
- Scouting locations and production design
- Storyboards and shot lists
- Production schedules
- Shooting
- Editing
- Sound design
- Color correction
- Visual effects
- Sound mixing
- Color grading
- Distribution
- Promotion
Pre-production
The earliest phase in the film production process, pre-production is all about preparation. This is where you’ll shape your idea, organize logistics, and lay the groundwork for a smooth shoot.
Step 1 – Concept and idea generation
Start with a spark. What’s the story you want to tell? Think about your main character, their journey, and the setting. The simpler your concept, the easier it’ll be to bring others on board. Ask yourself:
- Who is the main character?
- What challenge or journey will they face?
- Where and when does the story take place?
Step 2 – Budgeting
Funding your film can be challenging, so every penny counts. Budgeting is all about making your money work for you. Start with what you can realistically spend and track costs carefully. Think about the essentials:
- Equipment rental or purchase
- Paying cast and crew
- Props, costumes, and locations
Break your script into pages, estimate daily shoot costs, and use a budgeting template to keep everything on track.
Here’s a simple budgeting formula for financing a small film:
- Break your script into individual pages (p).
- Small film productions often shoot a specific number of script pages per day. For example, 8 pages per day (d) is a realistic benchmark for many independent or low-budget projects. To calculate the total number of shooting days required, divide the total number of pages in the script by the number of pages you plan to shoot each day:
Total shooting days=p/d
- Calculate a reasonable daily cost (c)such as crew wages, equipment rental, location fees, and other daily costs.
- Multiply the total number of shooting days by the daily cost to get the total production budget (b):
Budget (b) = (p/d) x c
This formula helps you estimate your film’s overall budget based on the script length, shooting schedule, and daily costs.
For a more detailed film cost breakdown, consider using a template to record spending.
When starting out, you may be able to do a full shoot very cheaply or even for nothing. Accept free help where you can, and don’t let budgeting put you off your creative ideas.
Step 3 – Idea development
Refine your concept into a workable story. Brainstorm alone or collaborate with others to add depth and detail.
One way to get the ideas flowing and create a clear storyline is with a mood board. It’s a tool to help organize, focus, and refine your creative ideas. This curated collection of images, colors, textures, fonts, and other visual elements that capture the vibe you’re going for, will provide a quick sense of the style and tone of the film you want to achieve, helping you to collaborate and ideate with your team.
Apps like iDeas for Writing can also help spark creativity.
Step 4 – Screenwriting and scriptwriting
With ideas ready, it’s time to write them down. Every film works from a “screenplay” or script, detailing every scene, setting, and interaction.
Scriptwriting is mostly about dialog and how the various characters speak. Descriptions of place or situation set the scenes but primarily you want a script that tells the story through their words.
Tips for writing a good film script:
- Make every word count. Feature film scripts average 90-120 pages, so snappy and sharp dialog gives good exposition.
- Write how people talk. It might seem obvious, but telling a realistic story is key.
- Study scriptwriting by taking a course or reading a book.
- Format it well for easy readability and sharing.
Step 5 – Hiring, recruiting cast and crew
We all need help occasionally, so adding personnel to the production is likely. Lower-budget “indie” films use volunteers to reduce labor costs. Friends, family, and local film students become actors, set dressers, or even camera operators!
But whether it’s on formal or informal terms, the process is similar. You want to find the best people for each role that the budget affords:
- Hold script read-throughs. Audition and screen-test actors.
- Watch showreels to check the technical skills of new crew members.
- Put the word out. Advertise a job on a casting website.
Step 6 – Scouting locations and production design
Finding suitable locations for the film shoot is known as scouting. Scouts search for interior and outdoor places that best fit those described in the script.
- Find adaptable, versatile spaces rather than changing the script to fit.
- Get permission to film. Seek and secure permits if required.
- Shoot in one place or use green screening for virtual backdrops.
Production design includes location scouting, but also the building of any sets or lighting rigs. Think of it as any preparation a location needs to allow filming to start.
Step 7 – Storyboards and shot lists
Storyboards are like a script for the camera to follow. A bit like a comic book for your film, storyboards describe key scene shots and camera angles with illustrations, breaking scene action into a sequence of panels numbered for production reference.
Typically hand-drawn in a rough sketchy way, you needn’t be an artist to get the point across. Software like Plot can be helpful in this part of the film production process.
Pair them with detailed shot lists to describe the contents of every shot or scene, what will happen, and what’s needed.
Step 8 – Production schedules
A production schedule helps with keeping the film production process organized. It typically takes the form of a day-by-day calendar, spreadsheet, or chart that timetables the filming.
- Divide script pages into days, allowing extra time for complex scenes.
- Make breakdown sheets and production strips for scene elements.
- Schedule in practical filming order rather than in script order.
Call sheets can then be created to instruct the crew on what needs to be done, by who, where, and when.
Production
With planning complete, it’s time to bring your vision to life. Production focuses on capturing the raw visuals and audio.
Step 9 – Shooting
This is the main events where your story takes shape. It’s all about capturing the raw video, all the shots and sounds that the script demands.
Top techniques for a successful shoot:
- Nail your shots: Frame your shots to match your storyboard/shot list.
- Pay attention to lighting: Use enough lighting to set the mood and achieve proper exposure.
- Get lots of options: Use multiple cameras if possible and shoot multiple takes.
- Capture great sound: Don’t rely on the built-in camera mic to capture audio.
Post-production
Congrats, you’ve wrapped recording! Post-production turns raw footage into a finished product. This phase includes editing, sound design, color correction, and visual effects.
Step 10 – Editing
Editing is crucial to shaping your film’s story as written in the storyboard and script, but it takes a lot of time and skill. Start by organizing and logging footage. Learn more about creating an organized workflow here.
This is where every best shot or “take” for each scene is sequenced accordingly. The goal is to entertain and captivate the viewer while also optimizing running time.
Start by storing and logging the filmed footage in a way that makes sense. Choose the best takes to create a compelling timeline. Refine each cut until your story flows seamlessly. The stages include:
- First Assembly: Arrange all footage into a basic, linear timeline.
- Rough Cut: Trim the first assembly into a first draft.
- Fine Cut: Perfect every transition, frame, and cut between shots.
- Final Cut: Add color grading, sound, VFX, etc, to the fine cut.
Tip: Short films run up to 40 minutes, with features averaging 75-210 minutes long.
Step 11 – Sound design
Sound design is about creating additional sounds not recorded on set — any audio used that isn’t music or dialogue.
Sound design includes adding extra sound effects, including ‘diegetic sounds’ (sounds that exist in the scene) or ‘non-diegetic sounds’ (sounds that are used for emphasis or to aid in telling the story) to create a ‘soundscape’ that helps build an immersive atmosphere around your visuals. You can learn more about diegetic and non-diegetic sounds here.
How you use, edit, and mix these elements can have a big impact. Sound can “bridge” together scene transitions, build tension, or deliver narrative cues.
Tip: Treat film sound and music as a character or storytelling device.
Be mindful that using any audible commercial music is subject to costly permission to avoid licensing issues. Check out the Artlist SFX library for royalty-free music and SFX assets. The browsable filters simplify the search for high-quality sound effects, with a variety of tailor-made sounds to choose from, allowing you to bring your ideas to life without worrying about legal issues.
Step 12 – Color correction
Not to be confused with color grading (which is more creative and we’ll cover later on), color correction is the process of adjusting the colors in your footage to make it look more ‘true-to-life.’
When color correcting footage, you just want to make sure that everything is exposed correctly, there are no weird color casts, and that skin tones and other colors in the scene look accurate.
One of the most important (and most challenging) parts of color correction is getting realistic skin tones. Subtle lighting, camera settings, and skin undertones can lead to unnatural or inconsistent results. To overcome this, use reference images, monitor with calibrated equipment and focus on balancing hue, saturation, and luminance in the skin tone range, ensuring natural and even results access different lighting conditions.
Another important thing about color grading is that you color match all of your shots – especially if they were shot in the same location – because color inconsistency can shatter the immersiveness of your film.
Color correction is carried out before visual effects, but after editing, in the film production process. This is because the VFX artist can create more realistic visuals when they have an authentic starting point, and a colorist only wants to have to spend time correcting the footage that will actually get used.
Step 13 – Visual effects
Visual effects or ‘VFX’ is adding images to the film that were impossible or impractical to shoot in the production stage.
VFX artists use software to add or remove objects, people, places, and… fireballs. The goal is to make these CG elements look as realistic and believable within VFX shots, or sometimes just to fix something that went wrong on-set.
Step 14 – Sound mixing
Sound mixing ensures every audio element within a film’s soundtrack is correctly balanced.
The primary goal is to set the volume levels to achieve clarity. Audio processing techniques like equalization (EQ), panning, and compression are then used to achieve a crystal-clear ‘mix.’ Sound mixing artists might also use effects like reverb or delay to help define the environment and make everything sound as though it was recorded together in one space.
Depending on the amount of recorded sound, this part of the film production process can be lengthy. A short film of 30-40 minutes long could require as much as 150-300 hours of sound mixing work.
You should also be aware of gain staging throughout the sound production process. This will make sure you’re achieving the best possible audio, and avoiding any unwanted distortion, or loud background hiss or noise.
Techniques for good film sound mixing:
- Monitor the mix using a good pair of headphones or studio speakers.
- Listen to how rough mixes sound across different devices.
Step 15 – Color grading
Color grading is often linked to color correction, but they are different. Color grading is more artistic and is used to style a film’s picture color in less natural and more intentional ways.
Every frame can be re-tinted digitally using certain palettes or filters. This can suggest mood, atmosphere, and often a sense of time. A great way to achieve good color grading on your footage quickly is by using pre-prepared LUTs. These are professional-grade color presets that instantly transform your visuals, giving them a polished, cinematic look. Explore the high-quality LUTs available on Artlist, designed by our in-house professionals.
Distribution and promotion
With the film ready to go, it’s time for release. Distribution is about how and where the finished product gets screened. The ways in which the audience hears about it is promotion.
Step 16 – Distribution
Finished films are marketed and shown by a film distributor. Separate from the film’s main production team, the distributor releases the film to the public.
Disney, Warner Bros, Sony, and Universal are four of the top film distributors in the trade. By working with theatres or even airlines, they set the release dates and run the advertising.
Global film releases may also need extra work. Foreign language subtitles and regional age certification are often handled by the distributor too.
In recent years film distribution has changed. The rise of streaming TV platforms like Netflix, Amazon, and Disney+ offer new ways to premiere movies.
Tip: Consider using online services and platforms such as YouTube or Vimeo to distribute your film independently.
Step 17 – Promotion
Getting the word out about your film is all about creativity and strategy. A great trailer, social media buzz, and clever collaborations all help build excitement. The film distributor is usually involved in deciding on the marketing campaigns.
Here are some top tips for crafting an effective film trailer:
- Keep it short: Cinema trailers average 1.5-2.5 minutes, with TV spots 15-60 seconds.
- Tantalize viewers: Give glimpses of the most exciting scenes without spoiling the plot.
- Simple audio: Try using a voice-over or text titles to explain things fast.
- Use an expert: If you have the resources, specialist agencies rather than production teams make trailers and previews.
Bringing your vision to life
Mastering the film production process is about transforming a great idea into a cinematic experience. By following this guide, you’ll be well-equipped to handle every stage, from concept to promotion.
To make your creative journey even smoother, check out Artlist — the ultimate resource for royalty-free music, sound effects, and stock footage. It is time to get creative — good luck!
*This article’s cover image was inspired by footage from the Film Students on Set story by Pressmaster
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